(_Sd._) "ANDREW FISHER, "_Prime Minister._"
"DEPARTMENT OF DEFENCE, "MELBOURNE, "_July 2nd, 1915._
"The Minister desires that you furnish a report upon the following matters together with any suggestions for improvements.
"1. Arrangements for the receipt and delivery of letters, papers and parcels to and from members of the Australian Imperial Force.
"2. Arrangements for the receipt and delivery of cablegrams to and from members of the Australian Imperial Force.
"3. Arrangements for notifications to the Department in Australia of the disposition of Australian Wounded in Hospitals.
"4. Suggested despatch of special expert corps to Hospitals.
"5. Frauds by impersonation at cable offices.
(_Sd._) "T. TRUMBLE, "_Acting Secretary for Defence._"
When I got this, I hesitated. Evidently the writer was not accredited as a war correspondent and his remark about having written me up in the _Sun_ and in _Punch_ did not count for much. But I was anxious then, as ever, that as many journalists as possible should be put into a position for seeing the fine things the troops had done and were doing; I noted the emphasis laid by the writer upon his acceptance of the censorship, and so I took upon myself to exceed my powers and asked Braithwaite to cable to Mr. Murdoch:--
"This cable is your authority to come to G.H.Q. at once whence you will be sent to Anzac.
Mr. Murdoch landed on the 2nd instant and on that date signed the following declaration:--
DECLARATION TO BE USED BY WAR CORRESPONDENTS.
I, the undersigned, do hereby solemnly undertake to follow in every particular the rules issued by the Commander-in-Chief through the Chief Field Censor, relative to correspondence concerning the forces in the Field, and bind myself not to attempt to correspond by any other route or by any other means than that officially sanctioned.
Further, in the event of my ceasing to act as correspondent with the British Forces, I will not during the continuance of the War join the forces of any other Power in any capacity, or impart to anyone military information of a confidential nature or of a kind such that its disclosure is likely to prejudice military operations, which may have been acquired by me while with the British Forces in the Field, or publish any writing, plan, map, sketch, photograph or other picture on military subjects, the material for which has been acquired by me in a similar manner, unless first submitted by me to the Chief Field Censor for censorship and passed for publication by him.